Facing Your Fears - Public Speaking
Five Tips to Tackle Your Next Public Speaking Opportunity
The COVID-19 pandemic forced us to make changes. It’s changed the way we do business, the way we connect with others and the way we communicate. Virtual meetings and working from home make turning your camera on a necessity rather than just an option. And it forced those of us who break into a cold sweat just thinking about public speaking to face our fears. That’s not a bad thing!
I’m a behind-the-scenes kind of gal. I’m not comfortable being the center of attention. I’ve never liked being on camera. Nerves sometimes take over when I have to give presentations and I rarely volunteer to give a speech. I have vivid memories of delivering an on-camera candidate speech for student council president in high school. The video speech was then shown as part of the morning announcements. It wasn’t good - and needless to say, I didn’t win.
As a newscast producer, I was a behind-the-scenes leader. A producer determines the news content for a show, the treatment of each story (whether or not it has a reporter, video, graphics, etc.), and the order in which the stories appear. Then, they work with other members of the news team to get the show on the air. Everything from writing stories and approving scripts, to making last-minute changes, but rarely appearing on camera.
After switching to public relations, it became clear that while I would mostly be able to stay behind the scenes, I would have to sharpen my presentation skills. Preparing people for media interviews, developing key messages and talking points, and conducting media training sessions gave me good material, but I still needed to get comfortable giving presentations. Comfort for me comes in the form of being prepared. The more prepared I am, the more confident I feel.
I found myself in a unique position last fall when I was tapped to cover for my colleague Katharine Foley and host the Milwaukee COVID-19 media briefings. These twice-weekly media briefings feature key elected officials and health officers and are attended by almost every media outlet in Milwaukee. It’s one thing to give a speech to a group of students or present a plan to clients, but host a live media briefing? In short order, I would have to get comfortable on camera. I found myself once again leaning into preparation to feel more confident.
As I navigate through virtual meetings, client presentations and start to deliver presentations to larger audiences, I discovered a few things that are helpful. Here are my tips to successfully tackle your next public speaking opportunity.
Find your confidence What makes you feel confident? It may be a favorite item of clothing or jewelry. It may be a really strong presentation deck or an outline with talking points. If you have a script or outline, there’s no reason to be nervous.
Know your key messages What are the three most important things you want your audience to know? Once you narrow down your key messages, the rest of your presentation should be built around them.
Practice The more you practice, the less you’ll stumble. When giving a presentation to a large group, practice helps ensure you are comfortable with your material and that your presentation fits in the allotted time.
Get social! If your event is open to the public, be sure to promote your participation on your social channels to encourage attendance. Be sure to tag the organizers or other speakers. Many conferences will have canned messages you can use. Be sure to encourage audiences to connect with your company (and you!) on social media as well.
Say “Thank You!” Be sure to send a thank-you note to the person or organization that invited you to speak. A post-event social post thanking the group and audience is another nice touch and may even help you secure another invitation to speak in the future.
As often happens, the more you do something the easier it gets. I am more comfortable hosting live media briefings, and much to my own surprise, I’ve even been invited to give presentations to journalism and public relations students at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, Marquette University and the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. After facing my fear head-on this year, I’ve found that speaking in front of a group in person or virtually really isn’t that scary.
Need help developing key messages or preparing for a public speaking or media opportunity? Kane offers message training and media training, as well as reputation management and executive branding. Contact us to see how we can help.
